Anthony Liccione

the coming

when the wolves
creep into town
a quarter past
a fifth of whiskey
from the bottle
is gone,

the hills
hide their faces,
sharp teeth dangling like
stars,
rabbits slip sleep away
in their beds of blood,

and I sit inna room
dimmed with light,
unable to sleep
chewing on the world
full of war, hypocrisy,
deceit and murder,
the tense of jobless
and a foreclosure
paper on my table

just knowing that
awful newspaper
will soon be coming,
shotgun from a car window
missing the porch steps
and landing on the dew lawn,
six in the morning.

CP

Anthony Liccione lives in Texas with his two children. His poems have appeared in several print and online journals, and he has four collections of poetry books.

Anthony Liccione

what tomorrow may bring

sometimes its like a time
bomb
waiting to explode,
two days ago
it was over
the lawn mower
needing a new
spark plug,
today it was
an argument
on why I didn't
put jackets on the
kids before school,

that's how
we are,
always have been,
with just
one slip of words,
crushed eggshells,
we're at war,
each other's throats
and loaded guns
in our tongues,
chrome in our
knuckles,

it always happens
like this
where glasses
will get broken
slaps exchanged
like handshakes
of friends turned
enemies, a judas
kiss to jesus;
then the screech
of tires to the
nearest bar,

where anxieties
will go down,
and butterflies
will come up,
and I'll return
home,
with wings
a new man,
lay next to
her light in sleep,
she will turn
to me with her hand
and no words
for what had
happened,
following down
between my legs
and bring me up,
and we will have
unremorseful sex,
and return to our
separate ends of
the cold bed,

and sleep in the
fierce of what
tomorrow will
bring.

CP

Anthony Liccione lives in Texas with his two children. His poems have appeared in several print and online journals, and he has four collections of poetry books.

Anthony Liccione

from the whores, pimps, drugs and bars

much of this doesn't exist anymore,
the ammunition to keep that pen firing,
such a place where you could buy powder
for 15 cents to kill someone
and then your nose,
is now bulldozed, replaced with
a new building called Little Paris,
don't know what touristy
shit they sell... but they say
his name echoes up from the ground, but

every time I buy some food
at Zankou Chicken,
I have to drive by Buk's old
apartment a block away.
too bad he moved to San Pedro.
what a waste.
to be away from
the whores, pimps, drugs and bars,
but I guess even guys like him
want a nice place by the sea
when they get old.

CP

Anthony Liccione lives in Texas with his two children. His poems have appeared in several print and online journals, and he has four collections of poetry books.